Dr. Lyall, who was surgeon on H.M.S. “Acheron” during the survey of the coast of New Zealand in 1844, says of the kakapo, or owl-parrot, that “at a very recent period it was common all over the west coast of the Middle Island; but there is now a race of wild dogs said to have overrun all the northern part of this shore, and to have almost exterminated the kakapo wherever they have reached.” Brunner, who visited the West Coast a few years later, makes a similar statement in his Journal. The early settlers could not distinguish between Maori dogs and these wild, half-bred curs. Thus R. Gillies, writing in after-years of the early days of the Otago settlement, which was formed in 1848, says, “For some years after the settlers arrived here the wild dog was the terror of the flockmaster, and the object of his inveterate hostility.” W. D. Murison, formerly editor of the Otago Daily Times, writing at the same period (1877), tells how in 1858 he and his brother took up country in the Maniototo Plains, which they reached by the valley of the Shag River. The wild dogs were very troublesome. The first was caught by a kangaroo-dog, apparently imported from Australia for the purpose of hunting them. “This particular wild dog was yellow in colour, and so was the second killed; but the bulk of those ultimately destroyed by us were black-and-white, showing a marked mixture of the collie. The yellow dogs looked like a distinct breed. They were low-set, with short pricked ears, broad forehead, sharp snout, and bushy tail. Indeed, those acquainted with the dingo professed to see little difference between that animal and the New Zealand yellow wild dog. It may be remarked, however, that most of the other dogs we killed, although variously coloured, possessed nearly all the other characteristics of the yellow dog. The wild dogs were generally to be met with in twos and threes; they fed chiefly on quail, ground-larks, young ducks, and occasionally on pigs. On one occasion, when riding through the Idaburn Valley, we came across four wild dogs baiting a sow and her litter of young ones in a dry, tussocky lagoon. To our annoyance our own dogs joined in the attack upon the sow, and the wild dogs got away without our getting one of them.... In all we destroyed fifty-two dogs between September, 1858, and December, 1860.”
Taylor White, writing in 1889, says, “I consider these dogs entirely distinct from the European dog. For the wild dogs met with on the Waimakariri River, in the alpine ranges of Canterbury, during the year 1856, were in colour and markings identical with those found in the alpine region of Lake Wakatipu in 1860, a distance of several hundred miles apart. There seems little room to doubt that they were an original Maori dog. The fact of their wanting the two tan spots over the eyes mostly seen in European dogs of approximate colour is a very strong evidence also in favour of this opinion.”
At one time wild dogs were so common in Marlborough and did so much damage on the sheep-runs that packs of hunting-dogs were bred for the special purpose of running them down. As settlement proceeded and the country became opened up wild dogs were gradually exterminated. The only ones which are now met with are curs which have taken to rabbits or to sheep-killing, and have managed to escape from their owners.
Bellingshausen reported wild dogs on the Macquaries in 1820, but it is improbable that they long survived the sealers, who probably generally brought them to the islands. As soon as the killing of seals and sea-lions stopped the dogs in all probability died out. Captain Musgrave, who was wrecked on Auckland Island in 1864, discovered wild dogs, like sheep-dogs, on the island. Their case, however, was probably similar to those on the Macquaries, for I am not aware that any subsequent visitor to the island has seen them.
In a reprint from the Auckland Herald of the 18th November, 1866, we read, “It is not generally known that about Otamatea and the Wairoa the bush is infested with packs of wild dogs, as ferocious, but more daring, than wolves. These dogs hunt in packs of from three to six or eight. They are strong, gaunt, large animals, and dangerous when met by a man alone. Not long since a Maori, when travelling from one settlement to another through the forest, was attacked by three of these animals at dusk, and only saved himself by climbing into a tree, where he was kept prisoner until late the next day. The extensive district over which these packs roam was once well stocked with wild pigs, but most of these have fallen victims to the dogs, and since this supply of food has failed the dogs have ventured after dark to the neighbourhood of Native settlements and the homesteads of European settlers in quest of prey.”
CHAPTER IX.
CARNIVORA—FERRETS, STOATS, AND WEASELS.
The Mustelidae, or weasel family, is the most heterogeneous assemblage of all the carnivorous group. Though differing much among themselves, they possess certain important characters in common. One of the most familiar is the presence of anal glands, situated beneath the root of the tail, which contain a more or less noxious and evil-smelling fluid. The three members of the family which have been introduced into New Zealand belong to the genus Putorius, which receives its name from the Latin word putor, a stench. The most notorious example is the American species, the skunk, whose perfume is so strong that David Harum records how a man who killed one went into the woods for a week and “hated hisself.”